Saturday, 14 May 2011

Las Vegas Day 10 - Departure Day

Packing was a nightmare with all the stuff to squish into the bags! And to check out by midday as well! Fortunately my sister was still here so we could put our stuff in her room.

After our usual breakfast at Terrace Pointe Cafe (though this time we had something different - salmon bagel and I had Baguette French Toast) we squished all our stuff into the 2 bags and just bummed around in my sister's hotel room. She had a good time playing Craps that morning, winning $400 and so she went out to spend it. When she got back I put Tangled on for Erika and hubby to watch so my sister and I could go check out some high end shopping in the hotel - namely Manolo Blahnik and Louis Vuitton. I ended up buying an EXPENSIVE pair of shoes (which I ordinarily wouldn't even dream of spending that kind of cash on - but hey I'm on holidays!), so I hope I take good care of them.

Then we came back and waited for my new brother in law to come back from his bike ride around the Grand canyon and he came as we were about to leave! So hugs and kisses all round and off we went to the airport.

So that was the fun part of the day. Next came our horror stories.

We arrive at the airport and the check-in people say that you have to electronically check-in. So we try to but we can't do it so we have to check in with the counter people. Then they tell us Julian doesn't have a ticket, and I'm like what? He is sitting on my lap, why does he need a ticket, I even have to pay for him and he gets no priveleges, no luggage allowances or anything. Anyway while hubby and the check-in chick are sorting that out, as well as trying to upgrade us to premium economy, we weigh our bags and find that there is a 50 lb limit on our bags when flying United. I mean, seriously! In Australia you can carry up to 32kg in a bag as long as you don't go over your total allowance. So we had to open up our bag and empty some stuff out and stuff it into the backpack that we were going to carry on and then check in a 3rd bag... luckily I packed away some small bags so we had somewhere to dump the stuff from the backpack! I ended up buying a cheap bag from upstairs anyway, even though I did ask hubby to get out my new Coach handbag/nappy bag and we could use that as the carry on. But no, he was too stressed out and angry about it yet trying to be polite so he didn't do that. Hmph.

We check in and we're on premium economy on the flight to LA. I don't remember paying for that, I hope that the LA to Sydney is premium economy.... Mike was on our flight too (the best man) and I didn't even know that till I saw him get on the plane.

So in LA we only had a 2 hour or so transit and we kept ourselves busy then. Erika used the toilet which was good so I didn't have to worry about THAT on the plane! And then we loaded onto the plane and I dosed up the kids on Phenergan and they slept better than when they flew in. Though perhaps flying at night time also made them sleepier too.

Arrived in Sydney 2 days later (left Vegas and LA on Tuesday, arrived back in Sydney on Thursday morning because of time difference) and waiting around at the carousel only to find that one luggage was still in LA. GREAT! It was the bag with the dirty clothes, and the shoes.. and my laptop. ARGH! And DAMN it's cold here in Sydney!

As an endnote, here are what people say about Manolo Blahnik shoes:

Madonna once described Blahnik’s shoes as “better than sex” then added “what’s more, they last longer”.

Cordelia: [to Eve] "Get out of that chair, and I will feed you those Manolo Blahniks - which are stunning, by the way." (From Angel TV series)

In the "Weird Al" Yankovic song Close but No Cigar, a nearly-perfect woman is described as "She wore a ribbon on her left Manolo."

In 1991 Marge Simpson was wearing a pair of Manolo's featured in a magazine